IBA VIENNA: Biotope City Wienerberg gets IBA candidate status

Vienna is planning an International Building Exhibition for the year 2022. It aims at developing proposals for future oriented solutions and approaches that are on the level of the challenges of our time. The focus lays on “New Social Housing”. After the housing market for low-income and even middle-income households has become almost inaccessible in the large cities of western European countries - a situation that is exacerbated by the strong influx of new residents, social housing has again become a central theme.
The IBA VIENNA: "The high value attached to state and communal responsibility and to active housing subsidies for social housing is a specific aspect of the Vienna IBA. Given the increasingly strained situation of the communal budget combined with the growing number of people who find themselves in precarious life situations, questions arise about the further development of existing instruments of subsidised housing."

Therefore for shure the IBA VIENNA will get a great interest, especially since no other city can show such a successful history of social housing as Vienna. After a rigorous selection process, projects will be presented that provide pioneering contributions to the major issues of urban social living and housing.

Meanwhile the IBA VIENNA has awarded the project of Biotope City Wienerberg the status of an IBA candidate. This means that the objectives and planning criteria of this project are seen by the IBA team and its advisory board as a major contribution to future social housing in the dense city.

The acknowledgment of the expert advisory board of the IBA: "The consistent approach of a multilayered conversion of contributions to the climate adaptation in new quarters takes up proactively and self -initiatively a very topical topic and is honoured as particularly interesting.The scientific monitoring of the quarter development is particularly important in connection with the climate relevant contribution. In any case, it should go on beyond the construction phase in order to obtain reliable statements and results from the measures implemented for future projects (impact analysis, microclimate, maintenance and care, utilisation qualities, commitment of the residents, etc.)."

IBA VIENNA will support the implementation of this project and it is to be hoped that, despite the usual savings in realisation phases, the goals of the project can be achieved so far that finally in 2022 the Biotope City Wienerberg will be presented as a pioneering exemplary contribution to the topic urban social housing .

Project goals of Biotope City reflecting major themes of the IBA VIENNA

The major themes for the IBA_Vienna 2022 are intended to form the framework for the activities over the next years and to remain effective beyond this period.

NEW SOCIAL NEIGHBOURHOODS: “...The creation of new social districts, the urban development process and the functionality and diverse usability of new urban neighbourhood form the framework for an examination of new forms of housing and living together…”

NEW SOCIAL QUALITIES: “... Therefore in the continuous development of quality standards – in the context of climate change, changes in lifestyles and socio-cultural life models – reference must constantly be made to questions about meeting goals and access to subsidised housing.”

NEW SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITIES: “... how to encourage individual initiative, the inclusion of new actors, new carrier models and forms of cooperation and participation as well as on a more general level creating awareness and the internationalisation of social housing.”